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Sunday 29 November 2026 Advent 1
LECTIONARY YEAR B BEGINS
What are you waiting for?
Isaiah 64:1–9; 1 Corinthians 1:3–9; Mark 13:24–37
Context: A Eucharistic service at the parish church in a commuter town on the outskirts of a city
Aim: To consider what we’re waiting for this Advent
‘O, that you would tear open the heavens and come down.’
‘Show yourself!’
‘Prove yourself!’
‘Make your presence and existence and nature undeniable, irrefutable.’
‘Shake the earth and split the ground!’
‘Make the waters boil in the fire of your presence.’
‘Shout, thunder, roar!’
The prophet’s cries in Isaiah are words that many of us have prayed.
LONGING
As we commence the waiting of Advent season, so often kept in quiet and with candles in darkness, we do well to acknowledge that cry of longing which reveals as much about our humanity as it does about God.
It’s related, I think, to the desire of our hearts – born out of fear, in the unstable and heightened international environment – which hopes that powerful, violent men with access to weapons will be overcome by other men, more powerful men wielding bigger weapons. Even though we know that is it the long, slow, relational work of diplomacy which does more to protect us and defend the defenceless, which saves lives rather than sacrificing human beings as collateral damage, the urge to long for ground-shaking action is a strong one. We want something to happen, and we want to see the evidence of it immediately. We long for mighty crescendos and for absolutes. We want to know for sure that everything is resolved.
LOOKING FORWARD
Paul, looking forward to the day of the Lord in his first letter to the Corinthians, says that the grace that they have received in Christ Jesus has enriched them in speech and language and gifts, by and for partnership with himself. How subtle the changes which he is delighting in. He rejoices not only in the great conversions which he speaks of in other places, but in the nuanced changes to what they say and how they say it, to what they give and what they receive. And the mechanism is subtle as well. It is by relationship, by prolonged engagement with the Spirit, by a lifelong pilgrimage with Christ that we are changed. More often than not, it is quiet, gentle, incremental change, but that doesn’t mean that it’s not significant change, echoing into eternity.
WAITING
The birth of the Messiah comes with no great trumpet fanfare; an angel comes bearing tidings but only to one teenage girl; the heavenly host sing praises in the dark skies around Bethlehem, witnessed only by a group of shepherds; the planets align to produce a single bright star, but it’s only noticed by a small group of astronomer-magicians far off in a foreign land. There’s no great voice from heaven, yet; no earthquake nor cracking ground, yet; no ascending nor descending on the clouds, yet.
In Advent we commence waiting, not only for the child in the manger, but for the whole incarnation event; for all of Jesus’ life-giving life. We are waiting for his presence, for his teaching, for his healing and forgiveness. We are waiting for storms to be calmed and barriers to be torn asunder.
We are waiting for his coming again and the kingdom coming in its fullness. In a sense, we enter into the waiting of the patriarchs and prophets, of Mary and of John, but our waiting is not a pantomime. We are sincerely waiting for and longing for more: for the fullness of God incarnate.
TRUSTING
In Advent, we make space and silence as we wait for the trumpet to sound, to listen for the still small voice; for the whisper of the Spirit; to the voice of the itinerant rabbi, whose disciples were changed not just by earth-shaking events, but by teaching and laughing and shared meals and minor miracles.
We trust that we will see the sun and moon grow dark, the stars falling from heaven, and the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory, because we trust the voice of the man who tells us. In the quiet, be alert. Don’t just long to be woken. Instead, keep awake.
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Issue 203: Preaching in an Age of Outrage
